A transistor is a device that controls the flow of electrons. This ability to control the flow is important in that information, in the form of electricity, may be processed or stored by the transistor. To process or store greater amounts of information, transistors can be collected together to form an integrated circuit. An example of an integrated circuit that processes information is a central processing unit (CPU), which can be likened to the computing aspect of the human brain. Another example of an integrated circuit, which can be likened to the memorizing aspect of the human brain, is a memory device for storing information. A computer comprises these two core integrated circuits—CPU and memory.
Memory devices have progressed from early designs, which consumed considerable power because of the need to continuously refresh the memory, to present devices, which are more desirable because of their frugal use of power. Presently, memory devices include low-voltage transistors. These low-voltage transistors use a voltage supply that is about 1.8 volts. Supplying too great a voltage to these low-voltage transistors, either by accident or design, would detrimentally affect the lifetime of these transistors.
Yet, voltage supplies larger than 1.8 volts exist in memory devices that include low-voltage transistors. Memory devices need these voltage supplies by design to perform memory operations, such as reading, programming, or erasing. In the event that a low-voltage transistor receives by accident an electrostatic discharge, voltages on the order of several thousand volts may undesirably enter and ruin the transistor. Such a lack of resistance by low-voltage transistors to higher voltages may lead to an eventual lack of acceptance in the marketplace for products based on memory devices that include such low-voltage transistors.
Thus, what is needed are devices and methods to inhibit the semiconductor breakdown that affects the lifetime of low-voltage transistors.